The Regulatory Chasm: Navigating Amorphous Privacy and Facial Recognition Technology in Global Law

The rapid deployment of Facial Recognition Technology (FRT) has created a legal chasm concerning the protection of “Amorphous Privacy”—the systemic right to anonymity in public space challenged by ubiquitous data collection. This analysis evaluates the divergent regulatory responses to FRT across major global jurisdictions: the rights-centric, structural prohibition model of the European Union (EU); the fragmented, high-liability private litigation model of the United States (US); and the constitutional but state-exempted model of India. Findings reveal a critical failure of traditional legal frameworks to address the cumulative harm of perpetual digital tracking and algorithmic bias. Specifically, the EU’s proactive bans contrast sharply with the US’s reactive statutory damage model (exemplified by BIPA’s massive financial exposure) and India’s new DPDP Act, which grants broad public order exemptions for government surveillance. The paper concludes that bridging the regulatory chasm requires a unified, prescriptive governance model centred on mandatory Human Rights Impact Assessments and structural accountability to ensure FRT deployment adheres to the principles of necessity and proportionality.